INDIA AND CEYLON 1926

The campaign began March 5th in a hall capable of holding a thousand people. From the first night it was a great success, hundreds being saved.

Smith in Ceylon, 2nd row, 6th from our left

Not a night passed without many standing up and reaching out their hands to heaven, calling out, “Jesus save me! Jesus deliver me!” Each night the evangelist would single out people in the audience who were in pain, and would pray for them. Immediately after prayer was offered the suffering ones would testify that they were free, from pain. If it was a case of stiff limbs, they were made to exercise them by walking up and down, running, stamping their feet, or waving their arms about in order to test whether the pain had actually gone.

One night a woman came up the aisle, walking in pain, her body all doubled up, and she finally fell on the floor in front of the platform, the pain was so great. Brother Wigglesworth jumped off the platform and put his hands upon her, and said, “In the name of Jesus I bind this pain and loose this woman.” Immediately she ran up and down the aisle, free from pain, and then went and sat down to listen to the message. She was perfectly whole. This demonstration had a great effect upon the crowd.

Some nights the evangelist prayed for over five hundred people, many of them coming hundreds of miles bringing their sick with them - the blind, deaf, dumb, lame, palsied, consumptive, eaten up with cancer, tumours, epilepsy, weak-minded, deranged, crippled. God worked mighty miracles; blind eyes were opened, deaf ears unstopped, stammering tongues spoke, men on crutches put them over their shoulder and went away, stiff joints were made supple, headaches and fevers vanished, asthma was treated as an evil power and cast out in the name of Jesus.

Handkerchiefs were brought in an ever-increasing number and piled high upon the platform. So many were brought (quite 500 some nights) that a fairly large suitcase was necessary to hold them all.

One night, while our attention was diverted, a boy stole six new handkerchiefs that had been brought. Two nights later he came back with them confessing that he had not been able to sleep since he had taken them. Many wonderful cures were wrought through this means. One was taken to a sanatorium and placed on a consumptive boy. The boy is wonderfully better, is putting on flesh and looking healthy.

Many people were helped by rising from their seats in faith and saying, “Jesus heal me,” without the prayers of the evangelist at all. One woman, who had eruptions on her arms and burning sensations caused by these eruptions, was healed as she sat in her seat. Truly these were wonderful days. God’s Spirit was poured out and Jesus was glorified

Walter H. C. Clifford. Colombo, Ceylon.

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INDIA AND CEYLON March 1926

Report published in Pentecostal Evangel, p. 11 May 22, 1926

BROTHER WIGGLESWORTH IN INDIA AND CEYLON

Brother Wigglesworth has been with us in Colombo, ministering for two weeks. He came very late in the season and found the heat very trying, and in consequence did not visit India. In Madras we had one meeting as we passed through Bombay to Colombo. I went to Bombay to meet him. The meetings were wonderfully attended here. There were over a thousand listening to the Word nearly every night.

It was a joy to see hundreds of people standing up with hands outstretched to heaven, asking Jesus to save them. Hundreds were healed of all kinds of diseases. Owing to the heat and the strenuous night meetings (some nights praying for 500 people), he was unable to have meetings for believers, as we should have liked. However, the visit was a great success and has brought blessing to many homes. He has left us now for Palestine, where he expects to stay about a month, reaching England in time for the Whitsuntide Convention in London.

The follow-on meetings have been wonderfully blessed. One woman in the Sunday morning meeting, after Brother Wigglesworth had left, was healed of three diseases. She came on the following Wednesday bringing fifteen friends with her, eleven of whom were saved that night as we gave the altar call. I had the job of immersing eight in water while Brother Wigglesworth was here. The youngest being a Singalese girl, seven years old. She had a wonderful testimony, and on the morning of her baptism, she had a vision of Jesus. It was a joy to my soul to take her in my arms and bury her with Christ in the water.

The Lord has given us another little son, born on Feb. 9. This makes us four children now. All is well, for which we praise the Lord. Brother may from Travancore is here helping me for a little while, and I am very grateful for his help. We have had strenuous times since Christmas with two conventions and nine meetings a week in between. Oh, for some men to come and stand in the gap. Walter H. Clifford, Colombo, Ceylon.

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CEYLON March – April 1926

Report published in Redemption Tidings, p. 9 April 1926

SALVATION – SIGNS AND WONDERS IN CEYLON

CANCER AND 14 YEARS’ BLINDNESS HEALED

Evangelist Smith Wigglesworth was to have held the last meeting of his campaign at the new hall in Maradana yesterday evening, but at the earnest request of hundreds he has extended it to some days more. He began his campaign on the 5th instant, from which day his audience increased daily until during the last few days the hall has been insufficient to hold the vast gatherings that come to listen to him and be blessed by him and be prayed for. People have been known to come from all parts of the Island with sick folk devoid of all hope of health, and to wait for hours till the doors were opened; and, if not all, the majority of them went away sound in body and mind.

As a testimony of the efficiency of prayer in healing sicknesses, Mrs. Speldewinde, of Kandy, who suffered from a virulent cancer in the stomach and whose case was abandoned as hopeless by scientific medical men, on Tuesday confessed to having been completely freed of the disease by Mr. Wigglesworth’s prayer. People of all sorts, of all ages and classes, of diverse religions and professions, have attended Mr. Wigglesworth’s meetings, and though there have been scoffers among them nearly all of them have gone away impressed by his words and his actions.

There is an undoubted spiritual atmosphere about the hall during the period the meetings last. Beginning generally about 6 o’clock, by which hour the hall is quite full, hymns are sung from the conventional sheet published by the Assemblies of God in Ceylon. Mr. Walter H. Clifford, of the Glad Tidings Hall, Borella, then delivers a sermon, which is frequently punctuated with exclamations of “Praise the Lord” and “The Lord be praised” from those who have benefited by the campaign. About 7.30 or 8 o’clock, when the assembly has been induced to an atmosphere of devotion, Mr. Wigglesworth himself begins to speak, and concludes by calling on the sick and the afflicted to stand. Most of them

Admit of Cure Straightaway.

Mr. Wigglesworth prays, the ailments ranging from headaches and pains in the body to rheumatism, catarrh, blindness, deafness, etc. Not a few children are brought by doting mothers and women of advanced age by loving relatives, and if their derangements are not set aright on the first day they come again and yet again. Confirmed drunkards and smokers have been purged of the desire for intoxicants, and persons suffering from consumption and diseases due to dissolute lives have admitted to have been cured by Mr. Wigglesworth’s prayer and their own. Many prominent people have been attracted to the hall, from which none could go away without a profound impression of Mr. Wigglesworth – his deep voice, his simple but weighty words, his remarkable personality, and above all the perfect confidence of his actions, as when he says “In the name of Jesus, come out of this woman,” addressing the evil spirit possessing the patient before him. “Are you healed?” he asks, and if the reply is in the affirmative, “Praise the Lord” he adds.

The publication of the Assemblies of God in Ceylon – “Miracles of Healing” – contains accounts of miraculous cures, and there are many households attached to this gathering where the need for a doctor is never felt. Faith in the efficacy of prayer sustains them in all their actions.

Considering the diversity of races and creeds in Ceylon the numbers attached to this campaign may be said to constitute a record, but each day the crowd swells in size, and yesterday night the compound adjoining the hall too was filled, some having arrived very early in the afternoon.

Evangelist Smith Wigglesworth’s campaign continues to draw big crowds nightly to the new hall opposite the Tower Hall in Maradana. Mr. Wigglesworth has a powerful voice that lends itself to a variety of inflexions, and although his gift of holding his audience gets somewhat weakened by the periods of translation the large gatherings that never diminish but rather increase from start to finish of each meeting are indicative of the popularity of his message. Every night scores go up to the platform to be cleansed of sin and healed of bodily ill, and a certain number never fail to testify to the Power whose aid the Evangelist with great fervour invokes. On Monday night one of those who thus testified was a woman who had been blind for fourteen years.

A lady resident in Kandy was brought down to Colombo about two weeks ago. She was suffering from cancer and was in “extremis,” and the doctors in Kandy had given up all hopes.

Eminent physicians consulted in Colombo were also of the same opinion. The day Evangelist Wigglesworth arrived the relatives of the lady called on him, at the Glad Tidings Hall at Borella, and asked him to see the patient. As he was unable to go on that same day he gave them a piece of cloth, which he blessed, to be placed on the seat of the trouble pending his arrival on the next day. Immediately the cloth was placed on the patient, she said she felt relief and that the agony she was suffering for weeks and the spasms of pain left her. The Evangelist saw her the next day and cast out what he termed the “evil spirit with was afflicting her in the form of a cancer,” and the lady is today perfectly well and able to get about. She is to testify at tonight’s meeting conducted by Smith Wigglesworth.

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Report published in Redemption Tidings, p. 12 June 1926

GOD BEARING WITNESS WITH SIGNS, WONDERS AND MIRACLES IN CEYLON

By Walter H. Clifford Heb. ii, 4.

The campaign began March 5th, in a large hall capable of holding a thousand people. From the first night it was a great success, hundreds were saved, not a night passing by without many standing up in response to the appeals of the Evangelist stretching their hands up to heaven, calling out, “Jesus save me, Jesus deliver me,” and then, as they stood up, the Evangelist would pray, asking the Lord to have mercy upon them and save them; then the whole audience would sing, “I do believe, I will believe, that Jesus died for me, that on the Cross, He shed His blood, for sin to set me free.” Every night he would single out people in the audience, who were in pain and pray for them, and immediately after prayer was offered the suffering one would testify that they were free from pain. If it was a case of stiff limbs, they were made to exercise them by walking up and down, running, stamping their feet, or waving their arms about in order to test whether the pain had actually gone or not.

Wigglesworth can be clearly seen in this Ceylon group photograph, which appeared in the Redemption Tidings. He is left of centre on the second row up. Next to him is a missionary, probably W. H. Clifford.

One night a woman came up the aisle walking in pain, her body all doubled up, and she finally fell on the floor in front of the platform, the pain was so great. Mr. Wigglesworth jumped off the platform and put his hands upon her and said, in the Name of Jesus Christ, I bind this pain and loose this woman, and she immediately ran up and down the aisle free from pain, and then went and sat down to listen to the message perfectly whole. This demonstration had a great effect upon the crowd.

Some nights the Evangelist had to pray for over five hundred people. Many of them coming hundreds of miles, bringing their sick with them – the blind, deaf, dumb, lame, paralysed, consumptive, eaten up with cancer, tumours, epilepsy, weak-minded, deranged, crippled, with rheumatism and many other kinds of diseases. They came an increasing multitude, and God worked mighty miracles. Blind eyes being opened, deaf ears were unstopped, stammering tongues spoke plain, men on crutches put them over their shoulders and went away, stiff joints were made supple, headaches and fevers vanished, asthma was cursed as an evil power and cast out in the Name of Jesus. It was a wonderful sight to see them coming, and to know that those who had faith, went away rejoicing, in a Living, Loving, Tender-hearted Saviour, who had delivered them from the power of the devil that had bound them for weeks and months, and years, or a lifetime.

Handkerchiefs

Handkerchiefs and garments were brought in an ever increasing pile, and were piled high upon the platform, so many were brought, quite five hundred some nights, so that a fairly large suitcase was necessary to hold them all; all sorts and conditions of people brought handkerchiefs and garments. Coloured handkerchiefs, silk ones, white ones, dirty ones, pieces of cloth, pillow cases, and many other things.

One night while our attention was diverted, a boy stole six new handkerchiefs that had been brought to be prayed for; a couple of nights later he brought them back, confessing that he had not been able to sleep since he had taken them away; how wonderfully God uses this instrument to reveal His mighty power!

We know that many wonderful cures have been wrought in this way, eruptions have vanished, and a case of insanity was wonderfully helped. The father brought a handkerchief for his son in the asylum; after it had been prayed over it was taken to the asylum, placed on the son’s head, and he at once began to speak like a normal being. Another one was taken to a sanatorium, and placed on a consumptive boy; the message brought from the sanatorium says the boy is wonderfully better, putting on flesh and looking healthy. Drunkards lives have been changed by these means, desires for gambling have gone, many wonderful deliverances have taken place. Glory to Jesus.

Many people were wonderfully helped by rising from their seats in faith and saying “Jesus heal me,” without the prayers of the Evangelist at all, but by just following his simple directions. One woman who had eruptions on her arms and burning sensations caused by these eruptions was healed as she sat in her seat. Truly these were wonderful days, God’s Spirit was poured out and Jesus was glorified, and the devil’s kingdom suffered great defeat.